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Alexandre Bissonnette was wrongly depicted as being manipulative and in control on the day he entered a Quebec City mosque and killed six men, his defence team is arguing in Quebec Superior Court today.
After three gruelling weeks of witness testimony last spring, Bissonnette was back in court Monday morning for the final stretch of his sentencing hearing.
Bissonnette pleaded guilty to six counts of first-degree murder and six counts of attempted murder in connection with the January 2017 shooting.
By doing so, the 28-year-old received an automatic sentence of life in prison.
What remains to be decided is how long Bissonnette must wait before he’s allowed to apply for parole.
His lawyers argue he should be given the possibility to ask for parole in 25 years. The Crown wants Bissonnette to serve his life sentences consecutively, meaning he would have to serve 150 years in prison before being eligible for parole.
Alexandre Bissonnette’s defence lawyer, Charles-Olivier Gosselin, said he will challenge the constitutionality of consecutive life sentences for his client. (Julia Page/CBC)
Bissonnette’s legal aid lawyer, Charles-Olivier Gosselin, was the first to present his closing arguments on Monday.
He said that several court documents presented during the sentencing hearings in April painted an inaccurate portrait of the 28-year-old.
The Crown had presented a ballistics report that found a semi-automatic rifle gun Bissonnette left outside the mosque that night jammed, preventing him from firing up to 30 rounds before having to reload.
But Gosselin argued that Bissonnette abandoned the gun because he had forgotten to take off the safety catch.
The defence said this shows, despite accounts from several witnesses who testified that Bissonnette carried out the attack in a calm and composed manner, that Bissonnette was not in control of his actions that night.
“To say he was calm and methodical is merely based on perceptions, not on proof,” Gosselin said.
Constitutional debate
The Crown, which will present its arguments on Tuesday, plans to invoke a controversial law brought in by the Conservative government in 2011 that allows judges to impose consecutive sentences.
That constitutional debate will only take place if Quebec Superior Court Justice François Huot decides there is a possibility he could serve Bissonnette with 150 years, once he has heard the closing arguments from both parties.
“I won’t enter into a constitutional debate for the fun of it, I will if I have to,” Huot told the court on Monday.
If the debate does go ahead, Bissonnette’s defence team will try to challenge the constitutionality of that law. They are expected to argue a 150-year sentence would violate his charter rights and represent “cruel and unusual” punishment.
During the sentencing hearings, Gosselin called on several expert witnesses who testified that Bissonnette showed potential for rehabilitation based on his level of intelligence and willingness to collaborate with health experts.
“It’s not delusional to say he could work on these things, given the time he’ll have,” psychologist Marc-André Lamontagne said in his testimony.
The semi-automatic rifle Bissonnette was carrying the night of the shooting jammed, preventing him from firing up to 30 bullets without reloading. (Court exhibit)
The defence witnesses depicted Bissonnette as a troubled, immature person who had been bullied throughout his youth.
His lawyers said this intimidation has followed him to the Quebec City detention facility where he has been imprisoned for the past several months.
Bissonnette is reportedly kept in solitary confinement, sleeps in an anti-suicide blanket and is under 24-hour video surveillance.
Gosselin asked in May that his client be transferred to a federal prison as soon as possible, to provide him with more suitable psychological assistance.
Superior Court Justice François Huot is expected to rule on that request this week, before breaking for the summer and returning in September, when he will hand down his decision on the sentence.
Beyond redemption, Crown argues
This week’s court sessions will be the Crown’s last chance to convince Justice Huot that Bissonnette’s crime merits the “exemplary sentence” it is seeking.
Prosecutor Thomas Jacques called his own psychiatric experts, who offered different depictions of Bissonnette’s state of mind.
Psychiatrist Gilles Chamberland said he doubted Bissonnette could grow out of his narcissistic, fragile personality, and would still present a danger to society if he were released.
“Even if the risk was one in a million, it would be too high for me,” Chamberland testified in April. He added that Bissonnette’s murders were “loaded with racism.”
Pointing to Bissonnette’s internet search history, and extensive collection of weapons, the Crown sought to portray him as a lonely person obsessed with mass murderers.
Louiza Mohamed Said became a widow on Jan. 29, 2017. Her husband, Abdelkrim Hassane, was killed in the Quebec City mosque shooting. She asked the judge to give his murderer an “exemplary” punishment. (Julia Page/CBC)
But the Crown’s most powerful piece of evidence may have come from the poignant testimonies of widows, children and friends of the victims, who explained how their lives have changed since the shooting.
Bissonnette was mostly impassive during their testimony. He did, though, seem to break down when the 14-year-old daughter of Azzeddine Soufiane spoke of her father as a hero who tried to disarm the shooter.
“I am proud. Proud of my father, of his action,” Soufiane’s daughter said.
Dozens of people who witnessed the shooting also described how their lives are now filled with a constant sense of dread at falling victim to another attack.
These deep scars were among the elements outlined in a court document submitted last week by Quebec’s attorney general.
In the 54-page document, Justice Minister Stéphanie Vallée “requests the court throw out the challenge” made by Bissonnette’s lawyers to the constitutionality of consecutive sentences.
She argues that article 745.51 of the Criminal Code, which provides for such sentences, “was put in place to reflect the tragic nature of multiple murder, by recognizing the value of each life lost.”
Vallée also rejects the argument that “hope” can be used in a judicial context.
Ultimately, she writes, it is at the judge’s discretion to determine, when, if ever, Bissonnette can ask for parole.
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